Music in the future?

JoeMNI

I'm just asking and not stomping my feet: Will music be enabled in the future or has Smugmug chosen not to go down that road?

I can understand if in the massive effort to get New Smugmug out, music was just set aside to worry about later. I can also understand if Smugmug thought there was no significant demand for it.

I didn't have music on my site before, but as the New Smugmug bills itself as fully customizable, I was planning to add it and disappointed to not find it possible.

I'm not mad or in a rush to get music, but I would like to know if Smugmug is working on adding music capabilities, if it is completely off the radar, or an update on where the progress stands.

Thank you,
Joe Mathews
MathewsNatureImages.smugmug.com

mbrady

For what it's worth, when I go to a site and it starts playing music, I close the tab.

WinsomeWorks

mbrady wrote: »

For what it's worth, when I go to a site and it starts playing music, I close the tab.

That's not the only use for music....at all!! I have several memorial galleries dedicated to good friends. One of them was a musician, and in a gallery or two, I have a song she wrote available to play. You have to click on the html link in order to play it, but then it can play instantly. I don't know at this point whether that will be possible on the New Smug. Also, it's fine if music instantly sends you running from a gallery. But for those of us who are musicians, or for whom the site may be completely about a certain member's band, etc., their viewers may have completely different goals from you in viewing the site. To each their own.... most of us simply don't want former capability taken away, whether it's something you may use, or not! If it's something we use, or know our viewers use, that's why we don't want to lose it!

JoeMNI

My original sentiments exactly

WinsomeWorks wrote: »

That's not the only use for music....at all!! I have several memorial galleries dedicated to good friends. One of them was a musician, and in a gallery or two, I have a song she wrote available to play. You have to click on the html link in order to play it, but then it can play instantly. I don't know at this point whether that will be possible on the New Smug. Also, it's fine if music instantly sends you running from a gallery. But for those of us who are musicians, or for whom the site may be completely about a certain member's band, etc., their viewers may have completely different goals from you in viewing the site. To each their own.... most of us simply don't want former capability taken away, whether it's something you may use, or not! If it's something we use, or know our viewers use, that's why we don't want to lose it!

I am -- was -- a composer and music was important to me long before photography. I didn't even know the Legacy version allowed music until I heard others complain the new version didn't have it. I only want to have my music on my site, so there is no copyright or royalty difficulties. And even if it was just a Windows Media Player window that my web-visitors had to actively click first would be fine with me.

I'm not angry or upset or militant about getting music since I didn't have it before, yet I am confused why it would be disabled when the old version could do it. In my original post, I even gave a break to Smugmug that music may have just fallen off the radar with everything that went into creating the new version of Smugmug. I could be wrong, but it sounds more like it was an active decision on Smugmug's part to prevent music capabilities.

I guess I could convert my audiofiles to a video format and upload them into a video gallery, but that seems tedious.

Again, as "fully customizable" was the repeated selling point in the New Smugmug roll-out video, it just seems curious that any feature would just be dropped.

If someone doesn't care for my music, they probably aren't coming to my website to view my pictures anyway. Both are a product of my creativity. Both different sides of the same artistic coin.

pmui07g

Please develop music feature and let customer to decide whether to play music in their sites or not. Consider Smugmug can play video now, I believe the development to play music will be simple. It is just a matter whether Smugmug listens to their customers or not.

eawucker

I echo the request to enable music via javascript like it was available in the past. Please.

rpwoodjr

I'm a new SmugMug user - just opened my account a few weeks ago. I have two Phanfare accounts (one for my family and one for my summer hobby as the volunteer photographer / videographer for a local summer baseball team for college players.) I have six days to make a renewal decision on one of those accounts. I became a SmugMug customer because I found out the hard way that Phanfare's "unlimited" upload feature actually turns out to have a 100gb limit - which I reached two weeks before the season ended.

Despite the additional $39 per year...and as frustrating as that surprise limit was to me, I may abandon SmugMug and stay with Phanfare for one reason... the ability to upload and play selected music with the slideshows viewed by visitors. This past summer, there were several players whose parents were 2,000 miles or more away and my photos and videos were the only way for them to stay in touch with their sons' baseball experience. Two of those families had not seen their sons in over 10 months because they went straight from school to our location. I had several parents / grandparents email me that watching the game-by-game photos in a slideshow format brought tears to their eyes - AND THE BACKGROUND MUSIC MADE IT EXTRA SPECIAL!!!

Sure, I could create slideshows outside of SmugMug...render them to video...and upload to my galleries but that's not feasible during the season with a 56-game schedule in 10 weeks.

SMUGMUG...please announce that uploading music for the slideshows is coming soon....even if the feature introduces a new user level that costs a little bit more.